The Story of the XFL

A League is Born

By 1999, the once-mighty Monday Night Football was
bottoming out, and in several demographic categories,
notably young males, the NFL was losing out to professional
wrestling on smaller networks and cable. Critics claimed
that the “no fun league” was sanitized and
hardly watchable. The week after the memorable Rams-Titans
Super Bowl, the WWF’s parent company WWFE, rolled
out plans for a new football league, the XFL. WWFE announced
that the XFL would take up residence in New York, Los
Angeles, Miami, Orlando, Washington, San Francisco and
two cities to be named later.

The league was dogged upon its arrival, with sportswriters
prognosticating that the league would feature the same
scripted theatrics that the WWF showcases, only on a
gridiron. Writers compared it to the USFL and other
failed leagues, while WWFE chairman Vince McMahon invoked
memories of the pre-NFL merger American Football League.
Over the course of 2000, the XFL worked on establishing
much-needed credibility. At first, when the league was
little more than McMahon’s idea, it seemed far-fetched.
The addition of Olympic network NBC as a partner virtually
silenced the folding chair and steel cage jokes that
had already been recycled ad tedium by sportswriters.
Credibility was further cemented with the hiring of
reputable sports executives, general managers and coaches,
nearly all of whom came aboard stating that if the XFL
were not real, they would not be in it. As the league
as a whole took shape, with the draft, player workouts,
ticket sales and uniforms, it was soon treated, albeit
with skepticism, as legitimate.

THE BUILDUP

The WWF built its success as a marketing machine, and
marketing was to drive the XFL to success. The XFL staged
its announcements in the XFL cities as they were visited
by the WWF’s traveling show. First, cities were
announced, then coaches and other personnel, then team
names, then uniforms, then players. As the season approached,
the interest continued to grow. The XFL received press
coverage that was unprecedented for a startup league.
Of course, that McMahon and his marketing machine were
able to pull it off did not surprise anyone.

The XFL’s aim was to produce a more entertaining
game than the NFL. The XFL aimed to speed up play, produce
higher scores and encourage player individuality and
celebrations that had been snuffed by the NFL. They
planned to put microphones and cameras “everywhere,”
and the game announcers would sit in the stands. The
uniforms were to be flashier and the stadiums would
be dressed up. Among the rule changes announced were
a one foot inbounds rule for complete passes, disallowing
field goals for points after touchdowns, reviving the
bump and run, outlawing fair catches, eliminating ‘in
the grasp’ QB protection rules, kicking off from
the 25 and reducing the play clock to 35. Scrimmages
in January 2001 were observed so that rule changes could
be tweaked, although they would be subject to further
tweaking even during the season.

McMahon predicted that the league would rival the excitement
of the Roman gladiator days, and would eventually expand
to become larger than the NFL. The NFL took note but
spoke little. Possibly in response, Monday Night Football
hired comedian Dennis Miller and miked players for replays
at halftime. The ump-cam was introduced, placed on the
bill of the umpire’s hat. Ump-cam footage was
used on replays only, though.

Well aware of the mass of financial nightmares that
killed several leagues before it, the XFL sought to
contain costs with a single-ownership structure, like
Major League Soccer. The players were to come from the
ranks of those who would just barely miss making the
NFL. The XFL would not pay as much as the NFL, but would
award salary bonuses for winning, ‘just like in
real life.’ The XFL continually insisted that
in no way would they be in competition for players or
fans. While in the planning stages, WWFE created a 50-50
partnership with NBC to operate the league. NBC had
been in negotiations with Dave and Frank “USFL”
Dixon and Time-Warner to form a football league to replace
the NFL after the network excused itself from the NFL
TV rights bidding war. The partnership gave the XFL
a Saturday night prime-time slot, beginning six days
after the Super Bowl. The XFL also scored television
contracts to broadcast on UPN (which has announced that
it would become the Paramount Network) and on cable’s
The National Network, née The Nashville Network.
TV was clearly the driving force behind the league.
The cities eventually chosen by the XFL were a mix of
large TV markets (New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San
Francisco) and major cities without the NFL (LA, Orlando,
Birmingham, Memphis and Las Vegas).

As the summer of 2000 approached, rumors began circulating
on the internet about the cities, team names, colors,
coaches and stadiums. Speculation focused largely around
the two “unnamed” cities. It was rumored
that accomplished former Colts coach Ted Marchibroda
would coach in Memphis and Buddy Ryan would head up
the Chicago team. One self-styled insider announced
that the XFL names would in fact be Birmingham Bloodhounds,
Chicago Skyscrapers, Las Vegas Gamblers, Los Angeles
Terminators, Memphis Pioneers, New York Nighthawks,
Orlando Orcas, and San Francisco Condors. Some of these
names were reported in the mainstream media. The alleged
Buddy Ryan selection made headlines on the day of the
Chicago team announcement. Some of the rumors proved
to be correct, among others the substitution of Miami
and Washington. The internet facilitated rumor investigation,
as users discovered that WWFE had reserved domain names
such as chicagoenforcers.com, laextreme.com and nychaos.com,
and had applied for trademarks for team names such as
“Maniax” and “Hitmen.”

The XFL dropped the big one in July 2000, when it was
announced that legendary Chicago Bears linebacker and
sub-legendary actor Dick Butkus would be the coach of
Chicago’s then-unnamed team. Like the NBC announcement,
the Butkus announcement was a stunning PR move, giving
the league a huge boost and shoring up its credibility.
Butkus lent his reputation to the league as a league
spokesman during the 2000 Sydney Olympics, which ultimately
resulted in his promotion to director of rules and discipline,
a position created especially for him. For many of their
other coaches, the XFL raided NFL Europe, taking half
of their coaches and adding decades of football experience.

Recruitment of players began early, with players able
to sign up via the internet. Indeed, applications flooded
in for the startup league. Players, too, had trouble
taking the league seriously. Many of the players had
mixed feelings about the league, unwilling to become
part of a circus-type show like the WWF. The presence
of reputable coaches, some who gave up prime coaching
positions, helped to further enhance credibility. There
was Galen Hall, who gave up the NFL Europe champion
Rhein Fire, and Jim Skipper, who left a coaching position
with the NFL Giants the season they went to Super Bowl
XXXV.

The XFL unveiled its team nicknames and helmets on
August 24, 2000, although as mentioned before, nearly
all had been discovered and reported by the media. The
reaction to the names and uniforms was initially mixed.
On the one hand, it was acknowledged that the names
were on the cutting edge, being at once futuristic and
apocalyptic, but they were a serious departure from
traditional football names. After the press gave a positive
reaction to the “Rage” helmet and logo,
Orlando GM Tom Veit was quoted as saying “you’re
just glad we’re not the Maniax.” Except
for the Maniax (see the Maniax’ team page), the
names did not prove to be controversial.

THE LEAGUE TAKES SHAPE

The first XFL draft, styled “Player Allocation
and Selection System” (P.A.S.S.), was held in
October 2000. All eligible players were signed by the
league and put into the league’s talent pool.
The draft was split into two parts, the territorial
round, where teams were able to take players from the
three area universities assigned to them, and the open
round, where all of the teams were able to select from
the talent pool. An additional draft was held in December
for players who were still under contract to other teams
during the October draft, meant for CFL players, except
that all were under contract until February. Trades
were permitted, and teams would continue to be able
to pick players out of the talent pool if they needed
one. After the territorial selections were made, the
L.A. Xtreme drafted QB Scott Milanovich first in the
overall draft.

Hype over the league continued to build up as the millennial
NFL season wore on. NBC ran ads showing “extreme
training,” where receivers caught footballs fired
out of a cannon, a lineman practiced blocking on a semi
truck, and a runner ran through a desert on fire as
bombs exploded around him. Other commercials featured
cheerleaders half-naked in a dressing room and cheerleaders
dancing in skintight shorts. In an article in ESPN magazine,
McMahon touted that cheerleaders would be encouraged
to date players (some NFL teams prohibited it), and
announcers would corner cheerleaders and ask them about
their intimate moments. He later modified this position
by saying player-cheerleader dating simply “would
not be prohibited.” Rumors about outrageous XFL
promotions such as cheerleaders giving fans lap-dances
during games were circulated, given credence by McMahon’s
reputation for outlandish utterances.

The November announcement that the league had hired
Jesse Ventura, the sitting governor of Minnesota and
former WWF wrestler, as an announcer, brought a considerable
amount of attention to the league. Ventura had agreed
with the league that the XFL would not exploit the governor’s
office, and Ventura assured that his Saturday night
duty would in no way interfere with his duty of running
the state. He pointed to the fact that he coaches high
school football in the fall, as a way of showing both
that he is knowledgeable about the sport, and that attending
a football game once a week did not interfere with his
gubernatorial duties.

Training camps convened in Orlando (Eastern Conference)
and Las Vegas (Western Conference) in January of 2001.
The early indications showed Memphis and L.A. as the
strongest teams. The rosters were trimmed bit by bit
and teams scrimmaged against one another, executing
a fixed number of plays in each meeting. Some full games
were played out, with the league watching to see how
their rules changes looked in practice, and NBC tweaking
its television coverage for the upcoming debut. Television
coverage was publicized as an “all-access pass,”
and the “ultimate reality TV show.” The
announcers and cameras would not be restricted. Two
helmeted and padded cameramen with steady-cams were
to stand on the field to record the action, from in
the huddle, in the locker room, and even in an ambulance
on the way to the hospital if someone got hurt. Announcers
would be allowed to approach a coach in the middle of
a game to inquire into the logic of a certain tactic,
particularly if it failed to yield a result.

Meanwhile, on January 9, 2001, an XFL-football blimp
crashed in Oakland, California. The blimp had been in
town to fly over the AFC Championship game between the
Raiders and Ravens. Winds carried the blimp away from
its handlers, causing the pilot and a student pilot
to eject. The blimp then carried on and landed into
a sailboat restaurant. Pictures of the twisted blimp
on the ground were all over the media, with reporters
wondering aloud if this was an omen of things to come.
Conspiracy theorists postulated that Oakland Raiders
owner Al Davis shot the blimp down. ESPN’s website
suggested that perhaps McMahon shot the blimp down,
on account of the publicity that it generated.

The revised rules were released on January 16, 2001,
generating a great deal of interest and curiosity. Specifically,
two of the least interesting portions of the game, points
after touchdowns, and punts, were drastically overhauled.
Extra points would have to be scored via a play from
scrimmage, and in the event of a turnover it could be
returned by the defense for a touchdown of their own,
for a point. Punts became live balls after 25 yards,
although punting team players could not cross the line
of scrimmage before the punt was in the air. No fair
catches were allowed either, but a 5-yard protective
“halo” around the receiver would prevent
him from being blindsided while catching the punt. With
the rule, the XFL claimed it was the home of “the
most exciting fourth down in football.” The “in
the grasp” rule was scrapped; the QB was deemed
down when forward progress was stopped. The XFL disallowed
head slaps, but allowed the bump-and-run down the whole
field. The offense would be allowed to have one man
in forward motion outside the tackle, as was done in
Arena football. Coin tosses were history. Instead, a
ball would be placed at the 50-yard line, and one player
from a designated position on each team would race out
to the ball. The first one to get control of the ball
would get to choose between kicking and receiving.

Overtime rules were extremely lengthy. Dubbed the “Can
you top this?” overtime, teams would get up to
four downs from the opponent’s 20 yard line to
score. If the first team scored, the second team would
have that many downs to score as well. These rule changes,
along with shorter halftimes and a shorter play clock
promised to shorten games to about 2:45, to wedge the
entire game into the 3 hours it was allotted on NBC
Saturday nights, and never would it interfere with the
start of Saturday Night Live.

In advance of week one, Las Vegas oddsmakers put out
lines on games and chances of winning the championship.
Oddsmakers had been so impressed with the competitiveness
in the scrimmages they watched, they had decided to
abandon the “wait-and-see” policy and issue
lines up front (although they did impose betting limits
in the beginning). The Los Angeles Xtreme were the favorite
to triumph in the first season going into week one,
followed by the Rage and the Maniax, while the Enforcers
were 12-1 longshots to win the crown.

The 2001 Super Bowl between the Giants and the Ravens
was a yawn-fest compared to the previous Super Bowl.
It was one of the lowest-rated Super Bowl games in history
and one that featured a record-setting number of punts.
This of course highlighted the tedium of the fair catch,
and in the following week, anticipation of the XFL was
very high. By the time the league got underway, the
league had a nationwide two-thirds recognition factor,
but there were many misconceptions about the league.
Sportswriters constantly highlighted that the league
was a minor league, and many people still believed that
it would be scripted. Some thought that the league would
be an overdose of entertainment covering up poorly played
football. And, of course, a lot of attention was paid
to the cheerleaders.

KICKOFF

Finally, on February 3, 2001, 366 days after the initial
announcement, the league kicked off in Las Vegas and
Orlando. Vince McMahon welcomed the sellout crowd, proclaiming
in his ringmaster style, “Ladies and gentlemen,
this is the XFL!” NBC unveiled its hyped coverage
during the first game between New York/New Jersey and
Las Vegas, with Matt Vasgersian and Jesse Ventura providing
commentary, as the Outlaws sunk the Hitmen. The game
was a 19-0 Las Vegas blowout, and the network cut away
in the second half to the Orlando – Chicago game
where the Rage was holding on to a thin lead with the
Enforcers threatening. Memphis barely held off Birmingham
for the only visiting team victory.

The best game of the opening weekend was the San Francisco
Demon’s upset of the preseason favorites, the
Los Angeles Xtreme. The Demons overcame a one-point
deficit at the very end, driving the ball downfield
with no timeouts and under two minutes left. On a third
and one with forty seconds left, the Demons failed to
convert for a first down, which would have stopped the
clock to move the sticks. On fourth and one with twenty
seconds, cameras recorded the confusion, as QB Ron Pawlawski
shouted “Mayday! Mayday!” while the Demons’
field goal unit scrambled onto the field with time running
out. The ball sailed through the uprights as time expired
to give the Demons a 15-13 win.

NBC and UPN made good on all of their promises. The
coverage featured close-up shots of cheerleaders, locker
room halftime, fast pace, on-field taunting. The ratings
were a mild surprise, with the game earning NBC a 10.1
overnight rating, and a final rating of 9.5, far above
the promised ratings. However, reaction was mixed. Some
writers panned the league’s showiness, dissed
the cheerleaders, and put down the lack of sportsmanship.
Vince McMahon was the focus of most of the attention,
drawing criticism from sportswriters

Sports Illustrated, featuring the new league on its
cover after week one, enthusiastically harped on the
level of play, comparing it to an elegant table setting
used for serving chili dogs. Others welcomed the new
league, praising its innovative style and the genius
of the creators.

Changes were made for week two. Matt Vasgersian was
assigned to the back-up game, while excitable WWF announcer
Jim Ross, was promoted to the spotlight game, where
he was teamed with Jesse Ventura. The league promised
to cut down on the use of the “X-cam,” the
camera suspended behind the offense, and to use the
traditional sideline camera more. In week two, Memphis,
New York and Los Angeles witnessed successful home openers.
On TV, NBC featured a better game, a two-overtime, come-from-behind
victory by the Xtreme over the Enforcers. As expected,
ratings dropped by about half, and attendance fell in
Orlando’s second home game. Nonetheless, sportswriters
predicted doom for the XFL.

EARLY TROUBLE

On NBC’s primetime game, ratings headed downward
all season, in spite of games that were undecided until
the very end. UPN and TNN got a huge boost from the
XFL, however. Attendance fell to below 20,000 in Birmingham
and Memphis, on the day many stayed home to watch the
Daytona 500, in which Dale Earnhardt died in a crash
on the final lap. Critics of the league who blasted
the presentation delightfully penned that the XFL was
getting what it deserved, and predicted that the league
would not finish out the season. Late-night comedians
joked about how boring the games were.

For the most part, the advertisers (Stacker nutritional
supplements, Spaulding, and among others) stuck with
the league, although Honda backed out. The U.S. Army,
which had been pressured into puling its ads off WWF
shows, claimed that the XFL ads touting its internet
series on basic training were having a positive impact.
But because of the low ratings, NBC had do dole out
make-up time.

Meanwhile, the competition in the league was improving,
with most games staying close until late. After week
three, the Demons, Xtreme and Outlaws were tied for
first in the west. Memphis underachieved in its first
few games while an Outlaws-Xtreme rivalry appeared to
be developing. The Rage was dominating in the east.
Birmingham was showing steady improvement. The Enforcers
fell to 0-3 in three road games in spite of impressive
play from its offense. The Hitmen elevated its backup
quarterback in an attempt to shake things up.

Even with rivalries forming and play improving, the
ratings continued to slide. Defenses improved faster
than the offenses, and scoring declined. This led the
league to kill the bump and run, resulting in marginally
higher scores.

As ratings on NBC tanked, the media jumped on the
league. The XFL made adjustments to its broadcast and
attempted to liven things up. They switched to a more
traditional sideline camera angle, they brought back
Vasgersian and installed Mike Adamle as the booth’s
third man. The league hyped a week 6 a segment where
cameras would be placed in the cheerleader’s locker
room. After Jesse Ventura made some critical remarks
about Rusty Tillman in week 4 in Chicago, the league
played up a Ventura-Tillman feud, even rearranging its
broadcast schedule to put New York’s next game
on. Tillman did not bite, explaining in a newspaper
interview that he was never interested in WWF-type theatrics.
The feud was short-lived. When the Enforcers met the
Hitmen on NBC in week 9, Ventura spoke little about
Tillman.

THE END

As the first season came to a close, the public image
was that it would not return. This was brought about
largely because of negative media coverage of the bad
ratings on NBC as well as criticism over the gratuitous
display of cheerleaders. Nevertheless, on every front
but Saturday night NBC coverage, the league appeared
to be a success. Attendance averaged over 20,000, and
ratings on TNN and UPN were very pleasing to those networks.
Early on, NBC proclaimed that it would honor its two-year
commitment, but later claimed that they would look very
seriously at its options. McMahon intimated that the
WWF wouldn’t hold their partner’s “feet
to the fire” and make them honor the commitment.
The indication was that the XFL would retreat from prime
time and use the plan originally advanced, putting the
XFL on cable and syndicated broadcast before making
the jump to prime time.

The football itself had shown drastic improvement.
The Hitmen and Enforcers both changed their losing ways,
as Orlando steamrolled over the rest of the league.
Birmingham sank to dead last after a 2-1 start. In the
west, Los Angeles excelled but the Demons and the Outlaws
put in uneven performances. Memphis, for all its potential,
never came together as a team and put in a lackluster
performance with some highlights, including a sweep
of Los Angeles. The Los Angeles Xtreme won the first
XFL Championship, christened the “Million Dollar
Game,” played on April 22, with ratings only slightly
up from the regular season.

After the season, NBC publicly expressed its disappointment
over the XFL experiment. Columnists wrote post-mortems
and danced on the grave of the XFL. It was a virtual
certainly that the league would not return on Saturday
night, and likely not on NBC at all. The league hoped
that UPN and TNN would carry the league on. TNN stayed
put as a cable partner, but UPN played hardball, attempting
to leverage its position as potential XFL savior to
renegotiate its WWF deal. The WWF would not accept such
a deal, and on May 10, 2001, the XFL was officially
discontinued, with a joint conference call by Dick Ebersol
and Vince McMahon announcing that the league could no
longer sustain the losses.

Proposals to buy the league were rumored, when the
Vancouver Sun reported that individuals interested in
purchasing league-owned video equipment were told to
wait, that the league itself may be bought outright.
Former NFL quarterbacks Troy Aikman and Warren Moon
were rumored to be interested in buying the league.
New forms of the league were even rumored, with Las
Vegas moved and Orlando restructured. XFL fans hoped
for a return, but nothing ever came to be.

AFTERWORD

Why did the XFL die after only one season? Jesse Ventura
blamed negative media coverage, and that has some truth
to it. The hype was heavy, and viewers expected something
a little more “Extreme.” When those who
wanted “extreme” only got football, and
those who wanted football got comedy skits and braggadocio,
everyone was disappointed. The XFL consisted almost
entirely of sub-NFL players that had been together as
teams for little over a month. The league did not live
up to the hype, something which could have been avoided
if the league had first developed a small following
on a small network, rather than exploding onto prime
time before the product was fully ripe. Any goodwill
that was earned before the season had been soiled. The
business decision to discontinue the XFL was a smart
one, because there was a big possibility that the league
would not have finished a second season had one begun.

As a season ticket holder, I enjoyed all five Enforcers
home games. The crowds were very energetic and enthusiastic.
The football was good- the first Enforcers home game
was on week 4, plus it got better as time went on. The
TV coverage did not capture the stadium experience,
and were therefore not as enjoyable. Nevertheless, the
XFL could have found a niche, but whether NBC and WWF
were willing to bear the risk to try and win it over,
and whether they would have been profitable in the process,
is unknowable. The next spring league that comes along
could learn a few things about marketing and presentation
from the XFL (as could the NFL), but the XFL did not
have the prime-time product, regardless of how it was
presented.

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